Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly suggested on Sunday that President Donald Trump would force his own government to shut down if Congress refuses to give him the funds needed to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border.

During an interview on CNN, host Dana Bash noted that the government would begin shutting down on Friday if a stop-gap spending measure was not passed by Congress and signed into law by the president.

“Will the president go to the mat and insist on funding his border wall as part of the stop-gap funding measure?” Bash wondered.

“The president has been pretty straightforward about his desire and the need for a border wall,” Kelly replied. “He’ll do the right thing for sure but I will suspect he will be insistent on the funding.”

As the Independentpointed out on Sunday, Kelly was not the only Trump administration official who hinted that the president was ready to allow the government to run out of money.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions told ABC News that the wall would be paid for “one way or another.”

About the Author

David Edwards has served as an editor at Raw Story since 2006. His work can also be found at Crooks & Liars, and he's also been published at The BRAD BLOG. He came to Raw Story after working as a network manager for the state of North Carolina and as as engineer developing enterprise resource planning software. Follow him on Twitter at @DavidEdwards.